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Report of a Committee 

Adopted at Stated Meeting, November 4, 1920 

BY THE 

MILITARY' ORDER OF THE LOYAL LEGION OF 
THE UNITED STATES 

COMMANDERY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS 




ON THE 

Teachings of the Professor of American History, in 

the University of Chicago, as to the Events 

of the Civil War. 



I 1 Z.-0 






iUft 
€'t.n !i 1920 



William E. Dodd is Professor of American History in the 
University of Chicago. 

Some of his teachings as to the Civil War and Reconstruc- 
tion days demand the attention of all patriotic citizens. 

In discussing terms of peace with Germany at the close of 
the World War, he said "the European powers sought a 
vindictive peace," and further said : 

"In our Civil War it was the same. The North, rich and 
powerful, would have a vindictive peace. The South must 
know the penalty of defeat. Reconstruction was a peace of 
vengeance." 

In a letter to the New Republic June 9th, 1920, on the 
"Responsibility of the Senate Majority," he said, "the 
peace given to the South at the close of the Civil War was 
a worse peace than that which has been laid upon Germany." 

In an article in the Chicago Tribune of last May he said 
"Was the lot of the South as hard and cruel as that of 
France or Germany? Let a few of the facts of our own 
history speak. The South was devastated as effectively as 
the wit of man could contrive. 

"It may, indeed, be doubted whether any other people of 
modern times has been subjected to harsher terms than were 
those of the South from 1865 to 1876." 

In claiming that President Wilson was seeking to put a 
restraining hand on the great ones of Europe, Prof. Dodd 
says : "Germany has been wicked beyond all modern com- 
parison. So men thought of the South in 1865. Wilson 
knows Germany well enough ; he knows also what were the 
effects of a vindictive peace in the South. As a boy he 
lived and played around the naked chimneys and charred 
ruins that marked Sherman's vindictive march in 1865. 
Few men in the North have any such personal knowledge 
of what Sherman and the North's policy of 1865 was and 
meant." 

As a reason for the cruel peace forced upon the South, 
Prof. Dodd says, "it was because Sumner, Stevens and their 
allies hated the Southerners far more bitterly than Americans 
hated Germans." 

To suggest that the infamous outrages perpetrated by the 
German armies in Northern France and Belgium could find 



a parallel in the conduct of the army that fought to save the 
Union, is an insult to the memory of our dead and to those 
loyal soldiers who still live, and to their descendants. 

General Sherman in reviewing the destruction wrought in 
the "March to the Sea" said, "This may seem a hard species 
of warfare, but it brings the sad realities of war home to 
those who have been directly or indirectly instrumental in 
involving us in its attendant calamities." 

James Ford Rhodes has written a history of the United 
States, including the period of the Civil War, with a very 
sympathetic spirit toward the South. Prof. Dodd calls 
Rhodes the greatest historian of the country and urges the 
reading of his history. 

Of the Union Army, Mr. Rhodes said, "The lofty personal 
character of most of the men in high command and the 
severity of the punishment threatened for breaches of dis- 
cipline are evidence of this ; nor should it be overlooked that 
much of the plundering charged to Sherman's men was 
actually done by Confederate bands." 

Prof. Dodd styles Sherman's campaign as "vindictive." 
For similar reasons Gen. Lee's invasion of Pennsylvania was 
also vindictive. Sherman's "March to the Sea" did much to 
hasten the close of the war. Jefferson Davis boasted that 
"Georgia raised food enough for her own people and the 
army within it, but feeds the army of Virginia." 

There were many sad and dark events after the surrender 
of Lee. The whole burden of the sad blunders of Recon- 
struction days cannot be laid upon Charles Sumner and his 
allies. 

Ex-slaveholders did not accept the results of the war and 
resented emancipation. They began to plan a practical re- 
enslavement of the colored people and inaugurated a system 
of peonage that has not entirely passed away. 

Loyal friends of the saved Union felt compelled to resist 
the conspiracies to destroy the effects of emancipation. There 
was also need to protect the f reedmen and the loyal whites of 
the South who were victims of all forms of outrage, from 
the Ku Klux Klan and other organizations. The practical 
re-enactment of the Black codes of the days of slavery was 
another reason for Sumner's Civil Rights Bill and other laws 
for the protection of the f reedmen. 



General Grant had no vindictive feelings against the South 
as shown by the generous terms at Lee's surrender. In his 
Memoirs he said, "There being a soHd South on one side that 
was in accord with the poHtical party in the North which had 
sympathized with the rebelhon, it finally in the judgment of 
Congress and of the majority of the legislatures of the states 
became necessary to enfranchise the negro in all his ig- 
norance." 

IVIr. Rhodes says "Sumner had no vindictive feeling to- 
wards the South, but stood forth the champion of an inferior 
race, and impartial suffrage was his cardinal and paramount 
article of reconstruction." 

[Rhodes' His., Vol. 5, p. 554] 

When Prof. Dodd says that the conquered South was 
treated so cruelly, let us quote his favorite historian, Mr. 
Rhodes, who says : "The common sense of the American 
people saved them from crowning bhmders. They confiscated 
(practically) none of the land of their prostrate foe. They 
hanged nobody for a political crime. These are grand re- 
sults, furnishing a new chapter in the world's history. Never 
before on the signal failure of so great an attempt at revolu- 
tion had a complete victory been attended with no proscrip- 
tions, no confiscation of land, no putting of men to death. 
Another Ireland would have been created in the Southern 
States had not our people been endowed in large degree with 
humanity and good sense. Their restraint is all the more 
praiseworthy as the assassination of the loved and trusted 
Lincoln and the alleged complicity of some of the Southern 
leaders in the crime wrung every victor's heart and seemed 
to cry out for vengeance." 

[Rhodes' His., Vol. 6, p. 49] 

During the period of Reconstruction there were sad and 
tragic mistakes, but the responsibilities were not all on one 
side. Ex-slaveholders did their full share in keeping the 
fires burning. 

Prof. Dodd's charges against Charles Sumner ignore the 
facts that he introduced into the Senate his famous resolu- 
tion not to perpetuate the memories of the Civil War by hav- 
ing the names of the "battles with fellow citizens" placed in 
the regimental colors of the United States." 



6 

At his death one of the finest eulogies was by one of the 
most distinguished ex-Conftderates, L. Q. C. Lamar, who 
said Mr. Sumner beheved that "there no longer remained any 
cause for continued estrangement between these two sec- 
tions of our common country." 

The men who fought to preserve the Union have not the 
least desire to revive any waving of the "bloody shirt'' or to 
perpetuate bitterness and strife between the North and the 
South. 

One of the objects of the Military Order of the Loyal 
Legion of the United States is "to cherish the memories and 
associations of the war waged in defense of the unity and 
indivisibility of the Republic." 

The Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United 
States, Commandery of the State of Illinois, rejoices to 
note signs among leaders of the South, especially men of 
prominence in schools and colleges, to have closer and more 
friendly relations between the two sections and openly avow 
a purpose to seek justice for the negro and to provide pro- 
tection and education for all citizens. 

We respectfully suggest to the Trustees of the University 
of Chicago that the teachings of Prof. Dodd as represented 
in articles in newspapers and magazines over his own name 
are partisan and unjust to the memories of the past and are 
not favorable to the spirit of harmony in the present time, 
and we protest against such teachings. 

Lieut. Duncan C. Milner, 
Gen. Walter R. Robbins, 
Major Edward D. Redington, 
Committee. 



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